I'll Do Anything - The Musical Version (sort of) (James L. Brooks, 1994)

The original version of James L. Brooks' 1994 film I'll Do Anything was a musical featuring mostly songs written by Prince. After disastrous test screenings of several different cuts of the film, Brooks axed all of the spontaneous outbursts of song and the neutered version tanked at the box office anyway. But bootlegs of the musical version have been circulating more widely now, perhaps as a result of a cease and desist served by Prince's estate to cinephobe.tv which planned to stream the musical version last month. There are at least two cuts floating around, one approximately 101 minutes, the other 140. I had a chance to see the latter but the "sort of" in the title of this post refers to the fact that both versions are work prints. Like all work prints, the quality is rough. Almost every scene is separated by leader (example below). There is no score and no titles. One musical number featuring Albert Brooks appears to be missing vocals. A few lines of dialogue are either missing or dubbed. So no one who has taken in this bootleg can claim to have seen the musical version in any kind of drop-the-mic fashion. *The* musical version probably doesn't even exist.

Some have suggested that part of the problem with the musical I'll Do Anything is that much of the cast (Nick Nolte, Albert Brooks, Julie Kavner, etc.) cannot sing or dance. And indeed, the most affecting moment comes courtesy of someone who can - Tracey Ullman nails the heart-tugging "Don't Talk 2 Strangers" early in the film. But a far more decisive roadblock was the fact that the 1990s were the most fallow decade for the musical in Hollywood history. Spontaneous outbursts of song were a hard sell to a 1994 audience (outside of animated features - The Lion King was the biggest moneymaker of the year). Brooks might have pulled it off a decade later in the wake of Moulin Rouge! (Baz Luhrmann, 2001) and Chicago (Rob Marshall, 2002) instead of Graffiti Bridge (Prince, 1990) and Newsies (Kenny Ortega, 1992). Even then, he would still have had trouble finding a sizable audience for his tale of Hollywood insiders, an apparent drawback afflicting another Brooks property, the similarly parochial (albeit brilliant) animated sitcom The Critic (1994-1995). 

The best way to approach the 140-minute version is as a deeply meta art film. One of several subplots concerns the industry's reliance on audience research. So when at a test screening Nan Mulhanney (Julie Kavner) informs the audience that, "There may be some scratches. Some of the colors may be off. There are not titles. And it has not been finally mixed for sound. And the music is temp. That means temporary," she could be talking in a manner most Rivettien about the very film you're watching. The title number is particularly ghoulish in this regard. It's an admission sung by producer Burke Adler (Albert Brooks) that he'll do anything to gain the audience's favor. Since Brooks did exactly that and excised this number completely, "I'll Do Anything" could be his (self-lacerating?) theme song. 

In its bootleg state, this version is less a film than a proposition awaiting phantom approval. I assume that, apart from general disinterest, the reason there may never be a official musical version is due to securing the rights to the songs. At the very least, it can serve as an excellent tool to teach film students the emotional and even straight-up narrative roles sound and music play in film.